fallen birdies do not fly
by noodlefucker
Summary: He shrugs, and it's a quivering, vulnerable thing, but it's enough.


(Cover Photo by 3fourdraws on tumblr)

 **A/N:** _I wanted to explore a concept most of FFN probably isn't that familiar with. This fic isn't as serious about the subject as I'd like, but homelessness isn't a joke. It's important to keep in mind the kinds of conditions others have to live through everyday._

 ** _Reviews are highly appreciated._**

* * *

i.

Shinjiro walks on the street. He walks for a long time.

The island has suddenly shrunk in on itself under the moon. Not the Dark Hour's familiar all-seeing eye, but the smaller, cleaner one, the real one, the real moon, and he reminds himself, goddamn it, it's the real world now- the real world. It's the real world (fuck) but he feels completely gone.

It'd be better if it were the Dark Hour now, he reckons. It'd be better if it lasted forever. At least then, he could swing around weapons in public, joke around with friends, mess around and beat things up, feel like a goddamned hero, feel like someone who's doing something good for the world, just once, just for once. But never again.

The urban landscape is a swath of blue and grey, and of muffled engines turning in for the night. A traffic light flashes insistently in the distance. He stands under the glare of a white streetlight. The parking lot is empty. He sees a bird's silhouette on the convenience store roof. It is jet-black against the choking clouds. He watches it. It moves about slowly. He stares. It flies away.

He sits down. The cement is cold and dirty and smells of gasoline. His bag jostles against his back. Inside is a bag of chips and 1000 yen. The shining overhead is blindingly bright, and it hurts to even look down. He can't see much around him, only the blazing beam of light cast down on him in a hellish halo.

If there is no light, he thinks, there is no darkness. He gets up and faces fear. He wipes the gravel off of his pants. He looks around. The bird is back. He stares. Another bird flies in. It lands next to its companion. He stares. There are vague remnants of a nest. He walks away.

ii.

He's sixteen and going to die.

Tatsumi Port Island has never seemed cold to him, not even in the depths of winter's breath, but now he knows. He knows, and he if only it could all stop there. It's not even January yet and he's not sure he'll make it there. There are no flurries, but the wind's howl taunts him, tells him he's a coward that can't even take a bit of a chill.

It's not like he hadn't gotten any help at all. Aki's gone looking for him every day since the incident, he knows, and Mitsuru, too. So the one day he slips a little, he's found out, pretending to browse through a pharmacy when he's just trying to conserve body heat. Aki sees him and it's so damned weird, so damned wrong. They stare at each other, Shinji shivering, Aki shaking. Asks, pleads, outright begs for him to come back.

Shinji's weak. He's weak, and that's why he wasn't able to control himself, that's why he killed her. He's weak, because when he hears his voice again, he lets his own slate-grey eyes soften like his. He's weak, because he thinks, just once. Just once, he thinks, just this once, but then he remembers once is too much.

His eyes harden to crush his tears and foolish hopes. He shakes his head because his voice has already broken.

Aki looks away. He takes out his wallet from the depths of his winter jacket, and fishes out a few bills. Shinji takes them. It'll help him immensely, even just this little bit, he knows. But he can't thank Aki like he would someone holding the door for him. If nonchalance is far too painful after everything, genuinity is twice as hard to bear. So he swallows, and he's sure the whole world can hear it, gives Aki a small nod, and walks past him.

But he's weak, after all, and when he looks back, he sees Aki looking as well, eyes full of tears. "I'm sorry," he says.

(I'm sorry too, Shinji tries to say, but he's too weak.)

And so it is he finds himself in a sleeping bag colder than the air outside, dreaming of snow, ice, and even colder eyes.

iii.

He's so damned tired.

It's hard. He's got shelter, food, sort of. Water. Air. Now that he's alive for now, he's just remembered everything else expected of a member of society. Hygiene, for one. He looks at his reflection in the public washroom and he knows that the figure in the mirror is homeless. It's just too obvious. But he can't afford a hotel check-in spa clean-up, either.

He's never gotten high marks in art classes, but he figures he's got enough creativity to get by. Soon, he's learned to go to the swimming pool's changing rooms for showers. The private ones, with the curtains drawn, so that others don't realize he has no intention to swim. They're not of terribly good quality, and fluctuate wildly in terms of temperature, but it's water, and it's clean. He memorizes the pool's most frequented swim times, and takes advantage of other showers running to cover up his own sounds of razors, toothbrushes, and despair.

He finds and devises better ways to go about things. Fills up water bottles with hot water to put in the blankets at night, makes little forts out of plywood and crates as shelter. Eats peanut butter sandwiches, which are filling as well as relatively healthy.

And tries, most of all, not to feel.

iv.

He's ill.

He's coughing and sputtering, and he's almost gotten used to thinking he's going to die. It's those damned scalding and freezing pool showers. Or the weather. Either way, he's definitely picking a new spot to clean up. He decides on the local college's locker rooms, which don't even ask for ID. He figures he looks old enough and gross enough to be a student there.

He continues along with life and fitting in. He's shopping for black clothes and more peanut butter. He's so sick of peanut butter, and cold nights, and no money. He wants to go back, he wants so badly to go back.

He couldn't, obviously- just remnants of his naivety crying out. He couldn't, ever. Not after the incident, not after the pharmacy, and especially not after they find out what he's taking. It's dangerous, the stuff inside will kill him, he knows, but it's better than to repeat what he did. He wonders why the cops haven't done anything yet. If someone dies during the Dark Hour, did they ever exist? He'd rather be thrown into jail for life than to spend the rest of it living with the knowledge.

His suppressants should be delivered in a few days. Strega aren't the kind of people who'd do favours, he figures, but maybe they'd net him a job of some sort.

v.

It's summer.

Humans adapt well, especially under extreme circumstances. He spends the spring months relatively carefree, as the climate isn't constantly out to get him anymore. He does odd jobs for Strega, though goes for the high-paying ones so that he needs to be in their presence for the least amount of time possible. In return, they deliver the suppressants on time. He runs some errands for some people in the neighbourhood, as well. For the first time in forever, he has pocket money to spare. He gets himself a beef bowl, a noodle bowl, and takoyaki all at once on the weekends. It's the good life.

Come July, and he's realized the time for summer vacation has come. Students will be out and about, and S.E.E.S. will be looking for him, and questions will be asked, and unnecessary feelings dragged out once again. If he thinks about anything other than how to survive to the next sunrise, he knows no amount of time is long enough to heal.

He takes on more jobs to be on the move, so that they have less chances of finding him. He spends afternoons at the movie theater, in with one ticket and out with five times the value. Sometimes, when he's running low on peanut butter sustenance, he loiters around at the mall all day, one eye out for clearance sales and the other for free samples. When he does have to stay outside, though, he slathers himself in sunscreen in the restroom before going back out.

Of course, he can't avoid the two of them forever. And of course it's Aki that finds him, again. He wears a white v-neck and red shorts, and Shinji wonders with a pang when the last time was that he even had the option of wearing such vibrant colours.

"Hey. How's school? How's Mitsuru?"

"We're all fine. I'm the new captain this year."

"Of the boxing team."

"You know me better than anyone," Aki says with a wistful smile. "Yeah. It's pretty good."

"Pretty impressive for a junior."

"Yeah, I guess... but it's not just Miki I'm fighting for now."

Shinjiro swallows. "So, everything else is still the same?"

"No, Shinji," and he barely tries to keep his voice steady. "Nothing's the same anymore."

vi.

Lying is too natural.

People ask too many questions. Where he lives, how old he is, where are his parents, what school does he go to. It's too easy, too damned easy, and he lists off random strings of numbers or characters, depending on what they ask for. A skill isn't acquired from talent, but need. He's never been too good an actor, either, but he could make a living off of it now; and, really, he does.

Come autumn, and the students are leaving the streets again, as well as the warm weather. He encounters Aki once more, with Mitsuru, and then Mitsuru alone. He finds himself lying like a criminal escaping conviction, and it scares him. Lies about housing, food, school, and so on. Aki watches out the corner of his eye like he doesn't care anymore, but as they're leaving he pulls Shinjiro aside and asks him what the hell he thinks he's doing. Shinji looks at his face- rage, confusion, hurt- and he doesn't respond because he doesn't know the answer.

The next time Mitsuru comes she asks him calmly why he lied, and what he's really doing. He tells her, and leaves out the drugs. He tells her not to tell Aki about this. She shakes her head. Akihiko, she says, probably already knows. Don't let him, Shinjiro says. Mitsuru gives him a funny look and says, if you care about him, you would do what's best.

He shrugs, and it's a quivering, vulnerable thing, but it's enough.

vii.

It's almost spring, and again he thinks of dying.

It's a blizzard. He didn't even know they had blizzards on the island. Staying outside, no matter how thick the blankets, wasn't an option. He considered youth shelters, but that worked out terribly the last time; adults preaching cultivation and enlightenment, or crowded snoring rooms with too many hidden burglars.

Everything's a blur of no particular colour, and he can't tell if it's the snow or he's just going blind. He wanders around, frost crusting on his cheeks, and stumbles toward a van. He's so fucking cold. Looking around, he checks for anyone. He assumes that people probably can't see him if he can't see anything in general. He steps back and takes a huge high kick at the car window.

He feels pain graze along his hands, though he's surprised he can feel it. Glass flies outwards towards him, he's pretty sure, and off of his hands; away from his face, is all that matters. The second thing he notices is the car alarm. It's something he'd forgotten about. Shit.

Thankfully, the storm's howling is enough to quell the noise or at least make it seem like due to the weather rather than a street punk breaking into cars. He doesn't wait around. Carefully maneuvering himself into the sea of glass, Shinjiro climbs into the backseat, mostly free of sharp debris. He huddles up and waits with held breath.

The alarm stops after what seems like an eternity. He figures he's pretty safe until the snow wears down. He looks over himself. His sleeves have tiny surface tears in them, and his hands are bleeding mildly, but it's not too bad. He picks out the glass pieces and throws them away. He's got no bandages but he figures it's cold enough to freeze his blood anyway.

He sits still and watches his own breath, feels his chest rise and fall. He won't die. Just won't fucking die.

viii.

It's a blustery April morning. The flowers and trees are smiling and laughing. It's the first day of his senior year. He knows because he sees the uniforms. Black and white, and the school logo pinned on the heart. Ribbons and ties. Freshmen and seniors. He stands a street down from the main entrance and searches the crowd for familiar faces and words and voices. That girl from class 2-B, he notices, dyed her hair red over the break. It looks okay. And that baseball club kid is sporting an unfortunate goatee. Which doesn't look very okay at all. The sights and sounds are all memories lived before, and yet so starburst fresh. A group mumbling about not getting enough sleep, and another about the new French transfer student. He hasn't been around this many people since his bimonthly pickpocketing session. And certainly not around this many people without questionable intentions for a long while.

He sees red, then; one vivid and one tempered, and both his longtime-friends. He shoves himself into the early morning shadow of the building and watches. Mitsuru steps off of the bus, Aki behind her. Her presence is commanding, as always, Shinji sees with a smile. Good, he thinks, even the rambunctious freshmen'll treat her like the queen she is. And she's not a royal he'd dislike obeying!

Aki takes confident strides behind her, but quickly catches up and matches her pace. He wears a confident air easily, maybe without even realizing it, an easygoing smile on his face. He looks around and waves to his admirers (!?), but never stops, accompanying Mitsuru the whole way.

Shinjiro keeps watching, but he realizes then that it aches. That should be him up there, that should be him, Akihiko and Shinjiro; he's the best friend, the partner, the other half. That should be him, dammit. Him. Fucking dammit!

He decides, then. And it's the first good decision he's made in a long time.

ix.

He looks around for anyone he knows. The last few students are trickling into the schoolyard as the hand inches towards the hour. He's planned it all out. He'll go in when there's no one else left to recognize him, and he'll sit right at the very back of the room, and he'll listen to the principal ramble on, because it's the entrance ceremony, right, and he'll comb through the crowd for them, and when the assembly is over he'll run over, and he doesn't really know what to do after that, but he knows once they see each other it'll be more than enough.

He decides then that it's about time to go in, and he slips into the school gates, quietly. The cherry blossom petals catch in his hair, and he would swipe them away any other day. The breeze whistles lazily in the branches, and the sunlight shines like hope. As he walks toward the front door, he thinks maybe things'll be slightly less shitty. He thinks of Aki, and Mitsuru, and their friendship, and of normalcy again, just maybe, and complaining about homework, and hanging out without worrying about surviving until the next day, and he thinks of being able to again stand there with them, and it'll be the three of them, then, walking one as confidently as the other, and knowing that they belong in this wretched world, somehow.

He thinks of their smiles, and their laughter, and he thinks of the tears at graduation, and maybe moving in together when they get older, and he thinks of what he'll major in, and he wonders what job he'll have, what kind of family he'll have, what kind of person he'll marry, what kind of kids, grandkids he'll have, and he thinks that maybe, if things work out like that, death is nothing to fear at all. He remembers Aki, and looks up at the unending clear blue sky, because that's more than enough to live for.

An unfamiliar adult, probably a new teacher, stands at the door. Shinjiro walks up to her and smiles. "Good morning."

"Sorry, sir, only students are allowed. You can sign in at the office as a visitor after the ceremony is over."

"I am a student here. Aragaki Shinjiro."

But when he sees the look in her eyes, he knows it's too late for dreams to come true.

x.

Two years from that day, he lies, dying, on the street. S.E.E.S. is gathered all around him, all tears and refusal to accept the inevitable fate. I've had a good run, he thinks, but if this is how it ends, so be it. In the end, he was able to make up with Aki and Mitsuru, and make friends of his own. He was able to overcome Strega's bullshit, and maybe he saved Amada from a fate like his. He laughs, and sputters. What a load of shit this world's been.

He lies, dying, and he'd do it all over again in a heartbeat.


End file.
